I read this on Facebook today, and on top of the high housing costs many San Francisco area teachers pay, they also have to pay the cost of their subs out of their sick time benefit? Is this what we have come to in the profession today? No wonder there are so many walkouts. I hope that gets rectified in the next round of contract negotiations, if not sooner. I read that the parents stepped up and raised the money to cover the sub costs, but what a shame that anyone ill with a serious condition like cancer has to worry about substitute teacher expenses on top of working hard to regain their health.

I'm in California. This is what is done and it makes sense to me unless there is something I do not understand. Please let me know if I do not.

We are under contract for the school year. We have a set amount of days that we earn for sick days, personal necessity, etc. If we have a serious illness AND we have donate sick days to a sick day bank we can have colleagues within our district donate their sick days to us. If we do not receive any or we have burned through was was given to us we need to pay for our sub, which in my district is probably around a $120/day. Just a guess. I'm not sure. Please keep in mind that we are still paid our contracted money. All we are asked to do is pay for our sub out of that money. How is that not a good deal? I've worked in many jobs outside of teaching. You run out of sick days you get no paycheck. So again, how is this not a good deal?

I have never paid for a sub. Ever. The school district pays for my sub if/when I need one. When I worked in private business, I never paid for anyone to work overtime to cover for me. The company took care of that if it was needed. The idea that teachers have to pay for their own sub is outrageous.

Iím with Hifi. I think most professions have sick days and when you use up your sick days (current year, past year, donated by friends) you are no longer paid. Iím sorry for her situation, but it seems to me that paying for a sub is a small price if she continues to receive her salary beyond her sick days. Sheís much better off financially that way than how it used to be: we were paid half-salary after we used up sick days, and when that ran out we received nothing.

I will add to what Hifi has written: there is a disability plan that you purchase as a young teacher that can cover you if you run out of sick leave days. Where I worked you can save your sick days year to year and this prospect of catastrophic illness was exactly why I hardly used my sick days. Saving sick days is not possible for some teachers though.

When I was on maternity leave, I used up all my sick and personal days after 2.5 weeks. After that, I was basically on unpaid leave. I didnít get paid, and the school had to pay a sub. Isnít that kinda the same thing? If sheís still getting a paycheck and not working, that doesnít seem right.

Of course itís terrible to be sick and have to deal with all the ins and outs of paperwork and figuring out the financial aspects, but am I missing something? I think it makes sense, unfortunately.

I havenít read the article but in my district if you have a serious illness like this and you use all your sick days your go out on disability or FMLA. You donít pay for your own sub. Thatís ridiculous.

When you run out of sick days in almost any profession, you don't get paid.
When I had cancer, I had to miss an entire quarter of school. Fortunately, I had plenty of sick days saved up, with plenty left over. My problem was that our school insurance was so bad that I had over $15,000 in medical bills to pay that weren't covered by our health insurance. Fortunately again, I had taken out a cancer policy that paid $10,000 of it.
There is no way to make long illnesses easy on anyone. If the illness doesn't get you, the bills will.

I think the main difference here is what hifi and others are saying is they are still paid their wages when they run out of sick days. Where as here- if you run out of sick days, you are docked your pay or not paid.

What hifi and others said. Sounds like a good deal to me-- if you've used all your sick days, they will still pay you something? That doesn't happen in most jobs. You're out of sick days, no more money. It sounds like she's still getting some money. The way the story is presented is misleading. Unless I'm not understanding.

In all the jobs I've had, I'd get nothing if I used my sick days and continued to need time off.

If they are still paying her a check after her leave days are gone. They could have made her go on unpaid FMLA instead. In the positions that fully pay the sub, the teacher did not get paid as well. I don't think it is fair to everyone else to continue to pay her her check and pay the sub too.

One time way back in 1996, I had a job as a social worker. I was paid a flat monthly salary assuming I worked my 40 hour weeks and covered my absences with leave time.

Well, I was pregnant and had to go on leave two weeks before the birth due to bedrest. Baby and I used up all of my leave-sick leave, personal days, and accrued flextime time before the next month's allotment was earned. (We earned 10 hours a month that added on at the first of each month.) I thought, "No big deal-so I'll have one day without pay..."

Holy sh!t! They took a HUGE bite out of my check. The day off involved was in February. We still got off work for Washington's and Lincoln's birthdays separately. So they took my monthly amount and divided it by the number of work hours in that very short FEBRUARY and subtract 8x that amount. In other words, a day off in February cost me almost TWICE as much as the same day in like August...

And we didn't even get to have subs--my work just piled up til the next day.

In my district, you can accumulate sick days up to ninety-six. Each year, there are twelve sick days and two personal days. If you use no sick days over eight years, you now have ninety-six days. The following year, you get twelve more sick days, but if not used, you revert back to ninety-six days at the end of that school year.

We also have disability insurance. When sick days run out, disability kicks in. So you are still being paid at 80% of your contract while on disability, but not paying any taxes on the disability money.

I think having to pay for a sub is awful. In my district, someone who is out for a long time does not get a sub, but a long-term sub. This type of sub makes over $200 per day after twenty consecutive days. The first twenty days, the long-term sub makes $160 per day.

The union in the district where the teacher who has to pay for her sub needs to do some better negotiating during the next round of negotiations. I would suggest they look into disability insurance, which is very reasonable in cost and this small amount is deducted from each check.

At first, I also thought it was ridiculous, but then I came to the same conclusion as others that it makes sense if she is still being paid her regular check (presuming she is out of sick days, of course). I agree that it's actually a pretty good deal for her to not be working at all but still getting part of her check.

My teammate had to be out on FMLA one year and she did not get paid at all once she ran out of leave days. Is it not like that in other places? The "benefit" of the FMLA was that her job was held for her and she was allowed to return the following year at the same rate of pay and she maintained her seniority (over having to "quit" and then reapply to the district as a probationary employee).

This is interesting to me. In my district, and I believe the state, you can accumulate 2 years worth of sick days, so about 300. I know I retired with 267 and that was after going back down to zero after a maternity leave. But once you use up your sick time it is an unpaid leave. Thanks for enlightening me.

Interesting thread. Our district would have a permanent sub take over for this kind of leave and therefore is under contract. I think it's simply sad that of all professions, educators can't get a financial break.

Here, you use all of your sick days and then you don't get paid unless you have some sort disability through Aflac.

Though, I know this isn't really the same, but we get 3 "personal" days per year. We have to "pay the sub" for our 3rd one. In other words, they take the sub pay out of your paycheck! I certainly don't think this is fair, either.

We don’t pay for a sub here but if you are out on leave (no maternity leave here— just FMLA) you use your sick days and any days after that are leave without pay. You also have to pay the district your portion of your insurance while you’re out.

I have a disability plan through my district in case I ever need it. It CAN be used for maternity leave if you are enrolled at least a year before you get pregnant.

We also have a sick bank that you can enroll in. You donate a day each year and can use days from the “bank” for major illnesses. I joined a few years ago and I know a few teachers it has helped tremendously.

Our sick days roll over each school year and there is no limit. It used to be that you could cash them out for 1/4 of your hourly rate when you retire but I’m not sure if that is still in effect or not. Technically, we get sick and personal days each year but it’s really all one big bank. We don’t ever have to pay for subs though- each school has a sub budget they use.

I'm in California. This is what is done and it makes sense to me unless there is something I do not understand. Please let me know if I do not.

We are under contract for the school year. We have a set amount of days that we earn for sick days, personal necessity, etc. If we have a serious illness AND we have donate sick days to a sick day bank we can have colleagues within our district donate their sick days to us. If we do not receive any or we have burned through was was given to us we need to pay for our sub, which in my district is probably around a $120/day. Just a guess. I'm not sure. Please keep in mind that we are still paid our contracted money. All we are asked to do is pay for our sub out of that money. How is that not a good deal? I've worked in many jobs outside of teaching. You run out of sick days you get no paycheck. So again, how is this not a good deal?

I think it sounds like a GOOD deal. We don't get anything if we run out of sick days. I got in a bad accident my 2nd year of teaching and was on FMLA for about 5 weeks. After my 10 days leave I got nothing, no salary. I was paid about $200 for over 4 months .. because the money I did make had to be used to pay for my health insurance, union dues etc and then 5 days of leave was deducted for each check leaving me with about $200 left. You get nothing if you have no days. This is exactly how it works if you go on maternity leave. You get nothing and you cannot use the sick bank. I couldn't use it for my most recent maternity leave and I couldn't use it for when I got in the accident.

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We don’t pay for a sub here but if you are out on leave (no maternity leave here— just FMLA) you use your sick days and any days after that are leave without pay. You also have to pay the district your portion of your insurance while you’re out.

Exactly this. We also don't get short term or long term disability insurance.